


Outrunning the Shadows

by estelraca



Category: Kamen Rider Decade
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 07:03:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1501187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/estelraca/pseuds/estelraca
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kaitou's relationship with Tsukasa changes each time his life changes, from the first time Tsukasa ends up in his bed to the first time they face each other clearly after all the sacrifices have been made, but there are some things that remain constant.  Spoilers for all of Decade.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Outrunning the Shadows

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for Kisaragi-Gentarou's Golden Week Tokusatsu Giveaway Challenge over on Tumblr, for the Tsukasa/Kaitou prompt.

_Outrunning the Shadows_

The first time Kaitou sleeps with Tsukasa is a heady blur of confusion, ecstasy, and terror.

It's three weeks after Tsukasa found him, dragged him out of Fourteen's world into a new land of wonder and horrors. Kaitou is just starting to get used to DaiShocker's headquarters, just starting to ferret out the various factions and intrigues that surround Tsukasa as their ostensible leader. He is somewhere between prisoner and guest and recruit—kept confined to headquarters unless he is with Tsukasa, questioned endlessly and repetitively on his own world, and yet given enough bits and pieces of information to begin putting together a picture of his new world.

It is a rather terrible world. There are creatures he has met and talked with who are not human, who he suspects may never have been human, and they do little to hide their bloodlust. There are others who are human or were human, others who spin him endless pretty tales of what DaiShocker is and the peace that it will bring to all the worlds, but Kaitou has eaten his life's fill of pretty lies already.

What does it matter what DaiShocker wants to do with the universe, anyway? If the scientists who poke and prod at Tsukasa on a daily basis are right, then the young ruler of DaiShocker, by simply existing, has set into motion a chain reaction that will cause the collision and destruction of everything.

At least here, in DiaShocker's headquarters, as Tsukasa's... what? Pet? Slave? He would say _friend_ , but he's not sure he has seen anything approaching friendship from Tsukasa for anything or anyone. Possessiveness, yes; curiosity, yes; even a strange protective instinct, Tsukasa's hand rising to be placed gently, oh so gently, on the shoulder of a scientist who is doing more to their subject than Tsukasa feels they should. But nothing like true friendship, not really.

Nothing like malice, either, though, and there is concern in the way Tsukasa's mouth dips down when the scientists tell him that the worlds continue to creep closer to each other, a terrible frustration in his sparring exercises that makes Kaitou wonder.

Tsukasa is not a hero. He is not a good man. But he is honest in his ruthlessness, honest in his desires, and he _fascinates_ Kaitou, attracts him in a way that no truly good man could, not right now.

And he is in Kaitou's bed, in the middle of the night, roughly rolling Kaitou onto his back, his lips pressing hard and firm against Kaitou's.

It isn't Kaitou's first kiss, but he hasn't had many of them. He has spent all his life dedicated to his community, pouring his heart and soul into creating order, peace, stability.

Poured his heart and soul into creating better pawns for the evil he unknowingly served, into teaching and tricking and _harassing_ his people into being more docile prey, and he does not want to think about his world at all.

Better to think about where he is right now, about the weight and heat of Tsukasa's body against him, about the feel of Tsukasa's lips on his. Tsukasa's lips are warm, chapped and cracked, but as soon as Kaitou begins focusing on them they shift, Tsukasa's mouth opening, his tongue sliding demandingly against Kaitou's lips and teeth.

Kaitou isn't sure if he actually meant to open his mouth, to invite Tsukasa's tongue in, or if he was simply gasping in shock and confusion and the last vestiges of sleep-blurred incomprehension. It doesn't matter, because once Tsukasa's tongue is tangling with his he invites it, deepening the kiss, breathing through his nose.

The scents of smoke and blood assault him, pouring down from Tsukasa into him, and Kaitou makes a soft noise in the back of his throat, freezing.

Tsukasa finally pulls away, and though Kaitou can feel his muscles trembling slightly, knows that something is bothering Tsukasa, Tsukasa's voice has only his usual demanding dominance in it. "What? Do you not want me?"

"No, that's not—I don't—" Kaitou finds himself blushing deeply, and is grateful to the darkness for hiding that sign of weakness even if it also keeps him from making out more than a silhouette of Tsukasa. Men loving men is not allowed in Fourteen's world—nothing that differs from the standard is allowed, but Kaitou _doesn't want to think about Fourteen_. He is here, in bed with Tsukasa—somehow, for some reason—and that is what he will think about. "You smell like a battlefield. Are you hurt?"

"I..." There is the barest hitch to Tsukasa voice, an uncertainty that Kaitou has never heard before. Tsukasa's hand buries itself in Kaitou's hair, and Kaitou can just make out Tsukasa's hair dancing around his head as the man gives a vigorous shake, like a dog after a swim. "I don't want to talk about it. I want this, with you, preferably, but if you're going to fight—"

"No." Kaitou's hands have reached up without his conscious volition, latching on to both of Tsukasa's arms. "No, I'm fine. I just wanted to make sure you weren't going to bleed to death on me or... or anything."

"No." There is a hollow, empty quality to the word, and Tsukasa's hand tightens in his hair. "I won't die. So this is all right?"

"Yes." Giddy relief runs through Kaitou as the word slides past his lips, a rushing, confused mixture of _desire_ —because Tsukasa's kiss had been so _nice_ , in its demanding, self-possessed way—and _taboo—_ because Tsukasa is a man, and he is a man, but if loving this human monster will annoy Fourteen and his pretty pets all the better—and _hope—_ because there is something bright and worthy in Tsukasa even if Kaitou can't name it, even if he's the monster who—

Tsukasa's hands begin a quick, authoritative tour of Kaitou's body, and all thought fragments into tiny snippets of sensation and emotion, not always connected, until Tsukasa is done.

It didn't hurt. That surprises Kaitou, in a vague, uncertain way as he lies, still panting slightly, beneath Tsukasa. Tsukasa's arms are wrapped around his chest; Tsukasa's leg still lies possessively over Kaitou's thigh and upper legs; and Tsukasa's tongue continues to lap, gentle as a kitten, at Kaitou's neck.

"Wasn't it supposed to hurt?" The words slip out on a red-gray string of thought, sliding through Kaitou's conscious grasp.

Tsukasa's gentle lapping comes to a stop, a short, sharp grunt of inquiry sliding out in its stead.

Kaitou begins to feel his limbs again, all his muscles delightfully lax, and with an awareness of his body comes embarrassment. He can't take back words already spoken, though, and he is curious. "Isn't getting ridden supposed to hurt? Especially if you've never done it?"

"It can." Boredom fills Tsukasa's voice. "But I didn't want you screaming in pain, I wanted you screaming my name. So I took my time, and I did it right, and we both enjoyed ourselves."

Embarrassment rises again as Kaitou tries not to imagine who might have heard him, whimpering and pleading as Tsukasa's whispered voice asked him to, locked entirely in the thrall of DaiShocker's leader.

The word _thrall_ is a bucket of cold water to his face, driving away the lingering tingles of pleasure and release. Kaitou tries to roll over, so that he's facing Tsukasa, but Tsukasa's arms tighten, holding him in place. "Tsukasa—"

"I was fighting." There is only the slightest hint of emotion in Tsukasa's voice, a tiny tremor beneath the veneer of boredom. "You're right. I smell like blood and smoke because I was fighting."

Kaitou settles back down, slowly, though his muscles stay tense, ready to move at need. "Who?"

"A creature. The... Grongi, that's what they're called." Tsukasa draws a short, sharp breath. "I was told I had to defeat the strongest one—if I did, the others would follow me. That's what Tsukikage told me. But there was... something wrong about the fight."

One of Tsukasa's hands pulls away from Kaitou, and then reappears, flashing a card in front of Kaitou's face. Even squinting and with the card centimeters from his face, Kaitou can barely make out any of the image—a flash of red, golden horns, a belt.

"I used this." The card is pulled away from Kaitou, disappearing back into Tsukasa's possession. "I used... all the cards I had, actually. And I still barely won. But I used that to end it, and when I killed the creature... there was..."

Silence reigns between them, heavy and thick.

"What does evil feel like, Kaitou?" The question is a whisper in his ear, quiet words that cause all the hairs on Kaitou's arms and legs to stand on end.

"It feels like betrayal." Kaitou swallows down the lump that tries to rise in his throat. "It feels like hopelessness and helplessness and a darkness that has no end, that no light can ever touch."

"Oh." There is a child's quiet hesitation in the syllable, a child's hesitant ruminations in the silence that follows. "Then maybe that wasn't evil I felt. I don't know. But it... I didn't like it, Daiki. I had to get out of my suit as fast as I could. I almost left this card behind. And the way the rest of the Grongi watched me... the way one of them bowed to me, her lips redder than the rose tattoo between her eyes..."

"It was just a fight, Tsukasa." Kaitou takes Tsukasa's hand in his, holds it tightly. "Just one more battle. It doesn't matter."

Tsukasa is silent for so long that Kaitou begins to think he won't speak again. When he does, it's almost his normal voice, though there isn't quite the self-assured edge to it that there should be. "Does anything matter to you anymore, Daiki?"

"I matter." He may hate himself, sometimes, for what he's done, for what he's helped to do, but he doesn't hate himself enough to die. Just enough to run, hoping he'll always be able to stay a few steps ahead of his shadow. "And, since the whole universe is possibly going to end if you don't do something, you matter. There won't be many places to run to if there aren't any worlds."

Tsukasa laughs at that, a low, dark chuckle that also raises the hair on Kaitou's body, though in a different way. "Ah, Daiki. I'm glad that I found you."

"Why?" The question slides out as heat gives way to cold, Tsukasa's body disentangling itself from Kaitou's. "Why are you keeping me here? Why did you come here tonight?"

"Because I like you." Tsukasa pauses in his dressing, honest surprise in his voice. "And because... you're not a part of DaiShocker, not really. You don't look at me and see the Great Leader or a science experiment or a warrior. You don't see good or evil. Do you even believe in good or evil any more?"

"No." That's an easy answer, at least. If there is good in the world, it is weak, lost, misguided, betrayed. He will not allow himself to believe in it again.

"I didn't think so." Tsukasa hops on one foot, briefly, as he struggles into his beautiful, skin-tight leather trousers. "They're rather fascinating concepts, you know. Doctor Shinigami talked to me about them, when I was a lot younger, before he left... but I don't think they apply here. Nobody else seems to care about them. But I got distracted. I came here because I like you, and because I like the way you look at me. Like you see _me_. Like you're curious about _me_ , not my armor or my power or the other worlds but _me_."

Kaitou finds himself staring in horror at Tsukasa's silhouette, realizing for the first time exactly how out of his depth Tsukasa is, how naïve and innocent the vicious soldier that Kaitou has seen torture his enemies truly is.

Tsukasa's hand cups Kaitou's cheek, his lips pressing a warm kiss to the other. "I like doing this with you. It's more fun than with a lot of the others. Sleep well, Kaitou. I'll see you in the morning. Lots more worlds to conquer and save, after all."

Kaitou nods, a half-mechanical movement, and watches Tsukasa's silhouette slip from the room.

He spends a long time staring at that closed door, mind whirring, telling himself again and again that he doesn't need to get involved in this mess.

By the time he falls asleep, he almost believes it.

XXX

The first time that Kaitou initiates sex with Tsukasa is the day before Kaitou betrays him.

He brings Tsukasa to his room, not wanting to think of Sayo possibly sitting like a quiet ghost outside Tsukasa's bedroom door, hating Kaitou for having any of what passes for affection from her brother. No, better to be in Kaitou's room—his cell, his holding pen, but somehow still _his_ , the closest thing to a refuge he has had since he began running.

Tsukasa doesn't fight him. He was worried, at first, that Tsukasa might, and he doesn't want that, not right now. But Tsukasa seems content to see what he will do, smiling that faintly arrogant smile of his. It's a smile that Kaitou loves, in the deepest part of his heart, though he has never told Tsukasa that.

_Will_ never tell Tsukasa that, he thinks as he uses all the skill that Tsukasa has taught him to bring DaiShocker's leader closer and closer to climax. Those words are locked away, now, hidden in a box buried so deep inside that he doubts he will ever be able to reclaim them, a box stamped with Fourteen's seal.

But a lack of words doesn't denote a lack of feeling, and if he is truthful it is Tsukasa's startled, breathless gasp right before he climaxes—a sound lacking the self-possession, the self-assurance, somehow lacking the _self-absorption_ that characterizes Tsukasa—that brings about his own climax.

When they're done it is Kaitou who cleans up, Tsukasa watching him from cat-slitted eyes, the smile on his face now wide and lazy.

"What?" Kaitou throws Tsukasa's jacket at the man's head as he makes his way back from the laundry basket to the bed.

Tsukasa, of course, manages to snag the garment from the air and runs it through his fingers, eying Kaitou speculatively. "That was pleasant."

"Yes." Kaitou crawls up on the bed with Tsukasa, lying next to him.

Tsukasa turns to face him, dropping the leather shirt on the floor. "Why?"

Kaitou can feel his heart rate double, though he hopes that nothing shows on his face. "No reason. I felt like it."

"You're changing, Kaitou." Tsukasa's fingers stroke gently down his cheek. "You're more certain of yourself. You fit in better here now. You're becoming a true part of DaiShocker."

Kaitou grins, a low chuckle bubbling in his throat, though he manages to suppress most of that. Let Tsukasa think he is taking the words as a compliment, as Kaitou suspects they were meant. "Well, I don't have many other options, do I?"

"You could ask to go to another world." Tsukasa says the words lazily, rolling onto his back and studying one hand against the fluorescent light shining down from the ceiling. "Though I don't know if I'd want to let you go or not."

"And leave all the shiny toys that they're developing here?" Kaitou keeps his voice intentionally light. "Never."

"Mmm." Tsukasa rolls back toward him, smiling again. "They are coming up with some impressive weapons, aren't they? Have you seen DiEnd?"

"I have." Kaitou has made it his business to see everything that DaiShocker has to offer over the last two months. There is so much information he has gathered, so much he could give Tsukasa, but the walls have ears, everywhere, and he doesn't know if Tsukasa would even listen to him. "Do you know who they're going to give it to?"

"No." Tsukasa shrugs, clearly unconcerned. "Someone who'll be a useful back-up when we begin the full-scale invasion of the other worlds, I'm sure."

_Someone who will kill you when you are no longer useful_ , Kaitou screams silently in his head, knowing that Tsukasa doesn't see the forces arrayed against him. "It's as powerful as Decade, don't you think?"

"No." The derisive snort that Tsukasa gives to the suggestion makes Kaitou grit his teeth. "There's no one as powerful as me, especially not when I have that suit. You've heard Tsukikage and the scientists talking, right?"

_More than you have._ Kaitou presses himself closer to Tsukasa. "Do you... believe... everything they've been saying?"

How to get Tsukasa to look at those around him and see them for the danger they are? How to punch through the arrogance that DaiShocker has helped reinforce and make Tsukasa realize that he is not as in control as he thinks he is?

No way, not given the information network that feeds back to Tsukikage, not without making himself a target—not without potentially triggering the civil war that is lurking within DaiShocker.

"Tsukikage's been with me forever." Tsukasa turns toward Kaitou. "He's helped with most of the stages of the operation. Plus he takes care of Sayo when I'm off fighting or making alliances or learning about the enemy or finding new worlds."

"True." Kaitou presses a kiss to Tsukasa's cheek, voice dropping to a whisper. "All very true."

"Kaitou—"

"I should get some sleep." Kaitou burrows down into the blankets, ignoring the perplexed look on Tsukasa's face. "Busy day being a prisoner tomorrow. Though maybe we could go out somewhere, get something to eat... have you tried sea cucumber yet?"

Tsukasa hesitates before giving a frustrated sigh, gathering his clothes, and walking away. When Kaitou asks him to turn the light off on the way out, Tsukasa pretends not to hear, continuing on his way.

After Kaitou has managed to turn the light off by throwing whatever he can reach at the recalcitrant switch, he lies alone in the dark, breathing hard.

Tsukasa cannot or will not consider that Tsukikage is not his ally, that DaiShocker is not truly his to control. Sooner or later there will be a rift in the organization, and Kaitou does not want to be here when it happens.

So he will leave.

He will take DiEnd Driver with him, running between worlds as far and fast as he can.

(It is not a gift to Tsukasa, taking the weapon that has been developed to kill him.)

He will survive, as he has always survived, the only goal he has left in life.

(He will not go looking for ways to save Tsukasa, to save Junichi, to save his world and all the other worlds.)

He will not look back, because the past only ever holds loss and failure.

(Kaitou is not a hero, and Tsukasa is not a good man, but Kaitou finds his heart aching anyway, in a way he had been sure, three months ago, that it would never ache again.)

XXX

The first time he sleeps with Tsukasa after the Rider War is somehow both a desperate last-minute decision and a planned kidnapping.

He brings Tsukasa to his new lair via one of Tsukasa's walls between worlds. It's been two weeks since Tsukasa returned from the dead, two weeks since the end of the devastation, two weeks since the multiverse returned to its proper form. Kaitou had spent the first three days after... _everything_ traveling with Tsukasa, Yuusuke, and Natsumi, sliding world to world in a desperate bid to outrun the memories they all shared.

(It isn't funny anymore when Natsumi shoves Tsukasa, her hand low, at the place where his ribs meet his belly, because that's where she stabbed him, that's where he bled to death, and all four of them can see it in the pause and silence that follows the familiar motion.)

(It isn't a game anymore, Tsukasa changing Yuusuke's form against his will, Yuusuke's scream as the scarab armor forms over him worse than the silence of Yuusuke's death had been.)

There isn't any outrunning the memories, Kaitou saw that before the rest of them would admit it, and so he fled before everything could fall apart.

He had expected Tsukasa to follow him. He had expected Tsukasa to find him.

Instead nothing, silence and loneliness, and when he can't bear it anymore Kaitou walks between worlds into the room where Tsukasa and Yuusuke are sleeping and walks out again with Tsukasa only semi-conscious beneath him.

_Walks_ isn't quite the proper word, because he is straddling Tsukasa's prone form, and the wall wafts down over him, over Tsukasa, bringing Tsukasa and the bedding and Kaitou and depositing them on the rumpled bed that Kaitou has been using for the last week.

Kaitou presses himself tight to Tsukasa, touching as much of Tsukasa's body as he can, and presses his lips hard against Tsukasa's. He tries to deepen the kiss almost as soon as he starts it, his tongue teasing at Tsukasa's lips, one hand tangled tight in Tsukasa's hair.

He has to wake Tsukasa and distract Tsukasa at the same time, to keep the man from maybe-possibly using his power to simply walk away. Kaitou's not sure if Tsukasa _can_ , yet, if Tsukasa's conscious control over his abilities has returned to the point where it's a possibility, but he had seen the first inklings of Tsukasa's control returning before he left, and he doesn't want to risk Tsukasa leaving.

Because Tsukasa could, if he really wanted to, if he really _needed_ to.

Because this power that Kaitou has just used, has used repeatedly in the past, is not actually Kaitou's, but just a mimic, a pale imitation of what Tsukasa can naturally do, a transmissible cancer that threatened to tear all the worlds apart until the four of them shed blood and tears and hopes to bring it all back together.

Not that Kaitou was actually involved in that play—not really. Just at the very beginning, when he tried and failed to save Tsukasa from suffering, and at the end, when Natsumi and Yuusuke somehow broke all the rules and brought Tsukasa back.

Summoned Tsukasa back from their memories, from the pictures that they hold of him in their hearts, and if Kaitou hadn't been there would it have been Tsukasa who walked back through those washed-out images? Would it have been someone different, some stranger wearing Tsukasa's face, a good man like Yuusuke or a light-dark child of two worlds like Natsumi?

_Is_ it Tsukasa that he's straddling now?

"I watched you die." The words pour from his mouth as soon as Kaitou breaks the kiss, whether he wants them to or not. "I watched you die and I helped bring you back and you didn't even come _find me_."

"I didn't need to." Tsukasa's words are far too calm, his face impassive or disdainful, Kaitou can't decide which.

"Oh?" Kaitou rears back, a sneer pulling at his own mouth. "I suppose I wasn't worth it, huh? Not when you have your pretty little pets to entertain you."

Tsukasa's hands both reach out, his right burying itself in Kaitou's hair and pulling to the point where it's almost painful, the left lying gently against Kaitou's cheek. "I didn't need to come find you because _you_ would find _me_ , when you were ready. You always have, Kaitou, from the very first time we met."

Kaitou blinks, held in place by the hand in his hair and the look of intense, beautiful _certainty_ on Tsukasa's face. "I didn't find you that time. You found me. You..."

He won't say the word _rescued_. He's still not sure if he believes in the concept again or not. But Tsukasa did save him that day, showing him a world more terrible and beautiful than he could ever have imagined, an infinity of universes that are now at his fingertips.

"You were ready for something else. You were looking for something else, something aside from Fourteen. You didn't need to come when I asked you to. You didn't need to stay at DaiShocker for as long as you did. You didn't need to take DiEnd when you left, or come find me again later, when I was ready to listen to you."

A brief snort of laughter escapes from Kaitou. "You _never_ listen to me, Tsukasa."

"I do, though." Tsukasa's lips turn down in the slightest pout. "Just because I don't always do what you want doesn't mean I'm not listening. It may have taken me a very long time, but that's one thing I've learned—to listen to you, and Yuusuke, and Natsumi, and use the three of you to chart my own path through the worlds."

"But..." Kaitou swallows hard, trying to reconcile the tight knot of emotions in his chest. "I wanted... why couldn't you come find me, just this one time?"

"How?" Tsukasa raises one eyebrow, then sighs, both eyes closing as a brief hint of pain flashes across his face. "No, that's not right. If I wanted to, I would have found a way. But... I needed to be there for a little bit, Kaitou. I needed to be with Natsumi and Yuusuke."

"She killed you." The words are sharp, a blade to wipe away the satisfaction on Tsukasa's face. "She got her power and she killed you."

"She saved the worlds." Tsukasa stares up at him, expression so grave, so utterly certain of himself, but with something... different in his face. Something Kaitou hadn't ever seen there when Tsukasa was the leader of DaiShocker, something that Natsumi and Yuusuke have woven into him through their friendship and their faith. "She did what I couldn't do, and I wouldn't have it any other way."

"You're not a hero, Tsukasa." The words are raw, bloody-tasting on his tongue. "You never have been."

"No."

Where did this poise come from, this acceptance, this _base_ for the assurance that has always been Tsukasa's? "You _killed_ the truest hero any of us have ever known. You brought him with you and let him be tortured multiple times and in the end you _killed him_."

" _No._ I didn't die with him, but I didn't—" Tsukasa's hand tightens in Kaitou's hair, ripping painfully at the strands just as Kaitou's words are ripping at Tsukasa's soul. Then they relax, slowly, and Kaitou is looking down into eyes somehow holding both pain and acceptance. "I didn't die with him. Watching him die... it helped... prepare me for my own death. Which isn't what I owed him, what he deserved, but it was all I could offer him, then. In the future... in the future maybe I'll do better."

"For him, maybe." Kaitou can hear the bitterness in his own voice, but there's nothing he can do to mask it.

"For all of you." Tsukasa's fingers stroke gently down his cheek, and despite himself Kaitou relaxes, leaning into the touch. "For Yuusuke, because he deserves so much better, even if he'll never ask for it. For Natsumi, because I should never have put her in a position to have to make that decision. And for you, Kaitou, because you and I are the most alike, and have the most history, and I owe you, too, for the man I am today."

"Nice to hear that I'm the one most like the homicidal Destroyer of Worlds." Kaitou smiles, masking pleasure beneath sarcasm.

"You are. It's why I entrusted them to you. You'll take care of them, no matter what." Tsukasa's hand grabs Kaitou's shirt, pulling him unexpectedly off balance, down onto Tsukasa's body and into a fierce kiss. "Because even if you run, you always come back, Daiki. You don't know how to stay and you don't know how to go. You aren't a good man but you're also not a monster—not like I was. You're something—some _one—_ special."

Special. Not broken, not damaged, not terrible. Special. Able to protect something precious to Tsukasa—something precious to Kaitou, too, because he loves Natsumi's smile, Yuusuke's guileless kindness, though he doesn't really understand either.

"I couldn't come find you." Tsukasa whispers the words between kisses. "But I knew you would find me, and I'm glad you did, and if you'll allow it, I will happily stay until morning, and I will gladly make room for you any time you decide to stay with us."

Kaitou opens his mouth to protest, to ask for more, less, something different, and finds that for once there is nothing more he wants from Tsukasa. Tsukasa is looking right at him, facing him directly and unflinchingly, talking of the past and the future.

"Don't run for a few minutes, Daiki." The words are whispered in his ear, followed by a swift series of nips to his ear lobe and the nape of his neck that send shivers down Kaitou's spine. "Just stay here with me, and enjoy the fact that we're all alive."

"That might be the only good advice you've ever given me, Tsukasa." Relaxing into Tsukasa's hold, Kaitou smiles at the man who was once DaiShocker's leader.

Tsukasa smiles back, predatory, fierce, and in one swift move rolls Kaitou over onto his back. "I've been learning, Daiki. A lot. I've learned about good and evil—about how far you can push the one before it starts bleeding into the other. I've learned about hope and despair—what happens when you abandon hope, what it looks like to hold on to it in the middle of absolute desolation. I've learned about running and exploring, the differences between the two."

Said with a slight hint of rebuke, a sharper nip on his shoulder as one of Tsukasa's legs slides between Kaitou's.

"I've learned who I am—where I come from."

That hint of pain again, that awareness and maturity that had been missing from Tsukasa when Kaitou first met him, and Kaitou's arms tighten around Tsukasa.

"And I've decided who I want to be." Tsukasa kisses him gently with that last whispered phrase, though the kiss ends with a slight nip to Kaitou's bottom lip. "The man that Natsumi doesn't have to kill. The man that Yuusuke doesn't have to die for. And the man that you'll keep coming back for."

"I've always done that." Kaitou arches as Tsukasa's hands work their way up under his shirt.

"Because I've always been what you need." So cocky, so certain of himself, but Kaitou has always loved that about Tsukasa even when it drives him crazy. "I was darkness when that's what you needed explained. But I think, now, we've both had our fill of dark and death. And even if we can never be what Yuusuke and Natsumi are—I don't think I'd be very good at it, even if I wanted to be—I can be someone worthy of their love. Worthy of your love. You're a reflection for me, Kaitou... one that I always want to have at my side."

"Bringing it back to you again, huh?" The words are panted as Kaitou writhes under Tsukasa's hands.

"And I can be _your_ reflection, Daiki. I can be what you need me to be." Tsukasa pauses in his ministrations, leaning forward to whisper once more in Kaitou's ear. "If it's what you want, of course."

" _Yes._ " Kaitou can feel the weight of conviction in the word, an acceptance of everything that Tsukasa is offering him.

It's the last thing either of them say for quite a while.

Tsukasa doesn't leave when they're done, though, staying sprawled limp-limbed on Kaitou's bed. He watches Kaitou clean up, his eyes half-slitted, and then smiles. "Hey, Kaitou... I don't think I've had sea cucumber yet. Why don't we go have some in the morning?"

"If we're both still here in the morning..." Kaitou slides back onto the bed, kissing Tsukasa's neck. "We'll see, Tsukasa. We'll see."


End file.
